Mets Suck!

Its official, the Mets suck! The Phillies won the NL East for the first time since 1993. I guess New York fans were worried about the wrong team not making the playoffs. In all honesty I was too, but that's mainly because I don't care about the Mets enough to focus on them. Anyway, I'm sure heads will roll in Flushing cause that's just the way it goes down in professional sports. If the front office looks at this whole thing realistically they'll realize that everything everyone knew would be a problem for the Mets actually ended up being a problem for them. It just looks worse because it happened so late in the season. Everyone knew their starting pitching and bullpen would be a problem this season. It's just in the beginning of the season when they jumped ahead of everyone else in their division, the other teams weren't playing all that well. Philly got hot at the right time and won 13 of their last 17 games. Talk about living in the moment. Good luck to them against the Rockies/Padres. (still won't know who's in til tomorrow)
The Bears suck and its not even Rex's fault this time.
The Chargers suck and there are plenty of reasons for it, including but not limited to: Norv Turner, Phil Rivers, offense in general and the defense. Once they solve all of those problems they'll be straight!
The Eagles should double Brian Westbrook's salary! They're a disaster on offense without him!!! Donovan needs him back there because no one else on that offense scares anyone. Osi sacked Donovan a million times. I'm kind of happy for him because we went to Troy together, but the Eagles are my team because of 5 so I'm a little pissed at the same time.
Brett Favre finally broke Dan Marino's touchdown record. No one has criticized old Brett more than myself, but I have to admit he's played pretty well thus far. I'm not totally convinced he won't revert back to his old throwing into triple coverage self, but I can't hate on him right now since the Packers are 4-0
Pepp got his revenge against the Dolphins.
Dallas looks like the class of the NFC. Yuck.
The Falcons finally got their first win today. Joey has played well 2 weeks in a row. My guess is he feels Leftwich breathing down his neck so he knows he better shape up.
The Steelers lost to the Cardinals. Mike Tomlin still looks good on the sideline though, so all is well.
Finally, move over George because Evander is about to release his grill "The Evander Holyfield Real Deal Grill. If it's cheap I'll definitely get one!

Random Stuff

The National League playoff participants are still undecided and there's only one day left. I don't know if this means that the NL is so bad that everyone is a contender or what, but that's my take on it. Now, that doesn't mean one of them won't eventually win the World series, but they all seem pretty mediocre right now. The Phillies and the Mets are tied and if they both win or both lose tomorrow then there will be a one game playoff. I hope it plays out this way!

Mark Ecko, the dude who bought Barry's 756 home run ball ran a poll and let "fans" decide what should happen to the ball. There were 3 choices: Send the ball to the Hall unblemished, brand it with an asterisk, or launch it into space. (rolling my eyes at that one) Anyway, the "fans" decided to brand the ball with an asterisk and send it to the Hall. That doesn't shock me at all. However I am shocked that the HOF is going to accept this ball and likely display it. They say them accepting it doesn't mean they endorse the viewpoint that Bonds used steroids, they're just happy to get it. Oh really? How can you display this ball and in the same breath say you don't believe Bonds used steroids. That doesn't even make sense. I'm floored that they would do this, I really am.

So I don't watch women's soccer and I'm not even going to pretend like I do, but there is one very interesting story surrounding the sport. The coach of the Women's U.S. soccer team decided to bench the goalie who hadn't surrendered a goal in about 300 minutes of play during the World Cup in favor of a goalie who hadn't played. Apparently this Briana Scurry is a legend, but still. The chic he benched named Hope Solo was pissed! Of course she was weary before the game, then when they lost 4-0 she was even more pissed. Someone put a camera in front of her and she let it be known how unhappy she was. She basically said that she could have made all the saves Scurry missed and this is not the past so it doesn't matter what Scurry has done in her career. She's at least half right. Whether or not she could have made the saves that Scurry missed is debatable, but she's right about this being the present and not the past. The coach was wrong for benching her no matter what you think about how she handled the situation. I'm not just saying that as an after the fact statement. She hadn't given up a goal and that should have counted for something. Her teammates decided to kick her off the team for the game against Norway because she'd be a distraction. They are all convinced the way she handled it was not in the best interest of the team. That's fine, but I wonder how they felt when the coach decided to bench her before the semis. Surely they couldn't have thought that was a good move, but I wonder if they had the nerve to tell him that.
Anyway, the Yankees will play the Indians in the first round. They have some good young pitchers, but I think this is the best matchup for us. Historically we haven't faired well against the Angels so I'm not sad about putting them off for at least one round. Hopefully our experience will lead us to a victory.
Notre Dame sucks. They might not win a game this season.
Top 20 teams have been dropping like flies today. This is why they need a playoff. The rankings don't mean a damn thing.

Race Matters

Disclaimer: Donovan McNabb is my favorite quarterback. Donovan McNabb says black qb's are scrutinized differently. He's right. I don't understand why everyone, especially the talking heads on tv and radio want to be so dismissive when a black athlete brings up race. Race is still very much an issue in this country whether people want to acknowledge it or not. People want to compare his scrutiny to that of Rex Grossman, Chad Pennington, Joey Harrington and etc. with all due respect to those dudes, they aren't half the quarterback McNabb is. The only thing he and Rex have in common is the fact that they both lost in the Super Bowl. Rex and the crew gets scrutinized because more often than not, they suck. McNabb is actually a very good quarterback (when healthy) He has a very good career winning percentage and the Eagles have been perennial Super Bowl contenders year in an out. Up until the past couple of years McNabb has always been the best player on the Eagles team. He's had to be Superman because except for the one year T.O. was there, he's had a gang of receivers who couldn't start for any other team. He's always gotten the most out of them and he's never complained about it. We fans bitch about his receivers year in and out, but he always defends them. You have to admit it takes a pretty big man to defend the likes of Todd Pinkston and Freddie Mitchell, but anyway. When black athletes bring up racial issues in sports I think it would do us a world of good to listen. Everyone criticized Gary Sheffield when he said the MLB owners preferred Latino players because they were easier to control, but no one stopped to think about the fact that Sheff has been in the league for 20 years! He's seen and heard a lot. I've never played in the League, but I believe there's a lot of truth to what he said. A lot of the Latino players come from poor countries and they have to support their families by any means necessary. Is it so hard to fathom that when they get over here they'll put up with a lot of shit to stay in the league? I mean come on, people go to work everyday and they HATE their jobs, but they can't just quit. People have children to take care of and bills to pay, so sometimes you have to go to work and put up with a boss and co-workers who are assholes! Sometimes when you have to take care of your family you have to do shit that you don't want to do. That's life for a lot of people. Everyone doesn't have their dream job! If only the talking heads had tried to look at it from some other point of view. For whatever reasons sports fans seem to think that just because blacks, browns and whites come together to try to win a game that there's racial harmony. Well, there isn't. The people on the field may be all chummy with each other but don't be deceived, they are still working in corporate America. The NFL, MLB and NBA are no different than any other Fortune 500 company. There are politics involved in every decision. Everyone thinks one day race will no longer be an issue in this country, to those people I say take off the rose colored glasses. Look at the Jena 6, this is the world we live in and its 2007. Things aren't going to change any time soon. I'm just sayin......

NFL week 2

So week 2 of the NFL is in the books except for the Monday night game, but I'm just going to go ahead and assume the Eagles will win. Anyway, the Falcons are just as bad as everyone expected them to be. I wonder when we are going to get to see that much heralded Petrino offense we've heard so much about. Next week would be a great place to start considering thus far they've only scored 10 points. That's not going to get it done.
The Chargers got drilled by the Pats last night. If they are supposed to be one of the 3 best teams in the NFL they really might as well go ahead and give the Pats the trophy. In fairness LT can't possibly have the type of season he had last year again. Can he? I doubt it, he set the bar way too high. Now maybe people will realize that Phillip Rivers wasn't that good last year it's just that LT was so good no one noticed.
Rex Grossman sucks! He must have some dirt on Lovie because there's no good reason for him to still be starting. The Bears defense will not be able to overcome his ineptitude 2 years in a row.
The Browns scored 51 points on the Bengals while the Bengals scored 45 points on the Browns. You expect that kind of offensive output from the Bengals, but for goodness sakes they can't be considered contenders when their defense is giving up over 500 yards of offense to the Browns.
The Saints have reverted back to their losing ways. Their offense has taken a step back and its mainly because the defense sucks so they have to play from behind and they insist on letting Reggie Bush get his touches. He needs to learn that in the NFL you can't run backwards before you run forwards. This is not the sorry ass Pac 10, they'll catch you. They need to give the ball to Deuce and get the hell out of the way. He might not be as "elusive" as Reggie, but at least he runs forward. They're looking more and more like that 3-13 team from a couple of years ago.
Matt Schaub looks like the second coming of somedamnbody. He's played extremely well and I'm sure Falcons fans are livid. Especially the ones who wanted him to be starting over that running back pretending to be a quarterback. (their words, not mine) Oh well, there's not much that can be done about it now.
Moving on, The Yanks beat the sux again last night. They got drilled Saturday, but they took the series. They needed it too because Detroit is only 2 games behind in the Wild Card standings. Boston still has a 4.5 game lead for the division. They'd have to try to lose it at this point.

Theeeeeeeee Yankees Win!

OH
MY
GOSH
We beat the Red Sux 8-7 in a very impressive fashion! It might not mean much as far as the AL East is concerned, but just the fact that we were able to come back from a 7-2 deficit, in the 8th inning, against our most hated rival is sweet enough! Okajima and Papelbon are 2 of the best relievers in the game, but my Yanks were unimpressed tonight. I could go into detail about just how we did it, but I won't. Just know that we did, and I'm ecstatic!
Troy University (my dad's Alma Mater) beat the hell out of Oklahoma State tonight.

Random Stuff

Damn I haven't written in this blog in a minute. I told ya'll it would suffer when I went out of town for 6 weeks. That's no excuse for my laziness, but let's just say I haven't been all that inspired lately. Anyway, there's a lot going on right now. The biggest story is Kevin Everett the player for the Bills who suffered a spinal cord injury. One day the doctors think he'll be paralyzed, the next day they think he'll walk again. I'm hoping he'll be able to walk again, but in the meantime I think they should shut the hell up and give it a little more time. When things like this happen it reminds me that these players make a lot of money to entertain us, but they still might be underpaid.
The Patriots were caught videotaping the Jets defensive signals. It's only cheating if you get caught, so I guess they were cheating. Maybe next time they'll put the videographer in the stands or somewhere a little more inconspicuous.
The Nets are going to give Allan Houston a try. That should solve all of their problems.
Apparently for this season's MLB playoffs, the AL team with the best record gets to pick whether they have a 7 or 8 day playoff schedule for the first round. While we're at it let's have them choose the umpires for the games, the time the games will start as well as who they want to play in the first round. Give me a break MLB.

US Open attire, Gold Medal, Wild Card

So the men at the U.S. Open need to step their wardrobe game up A.S.A.P.! They are all wearing the same thing. How tacky! The other day Donald Young had on the exact same shirt as the guy who eliminated him. This kid Isner who would eventually be eliminated by Roger Federer also had on that same shirt. The shirt wasn't even that hot! James Blake had on the same shirt as the dude he was playing also. It's getting ridiculous. I know Nike makes more than 2 shirts. Roger Federer is probably the only one who can get Nike to design something specifically for him, but the other dudes need to look into it. Federer had on this all black get up the other night, it was mean. He had on shorts that looked like tuxedo pants, and he accessorized with a shiny bag. Now the bag was a bit much for a man, but he's Roger Federer so he can do whatever the hell he wants! Anyway, Maria Sharapova got eliminated yesterday by some teenager. That sucks for her, but her little red dress was adorable. Venus and Serena seem destined to play each other in the semis. Serena's dress makes her look pregnant, but the announcers love it. Venus has her own clothing line so she's been able to show a lot of variety in her wardrobe. She's holding her own.
Team USA won the gold medal at the FIBA Americas games or whatever the hell its called. If Kobe is on the team they'll definitely bring home the gold medal from Beijing.
Yankees lost, Sux won. They had some rookie pitcher throw a no-hitter last night. Good for him. The good news for us is that the Mariners are on a 9 game losing streak. We have a 2 game lead in the wild card, hopefully we'll hold on!